Well, why not combine the two? Since spamming is prohibited elsewhere in the forums (read outside forum games, where it's practically encouraged), it will be much more difficult to spam your way up to 5 stars.When you take out post count, you remove the most obvious reward for spamming (whilst stars are still a reward, I'd like to hope that they are less of one than postcount, because the milestones in star acquisition are fewer and further between).Whilst removing all indication of seniority might cut down on spam, it does remove the ability of a new member to determine who is likely to be giving "better" information.

Oh so get rid of post count and turn the stars into the only means of telling how many posts a person has? That could work...

I guess my major hang up is that after spending an advanced amount of time on the internet I have been trained believe that when you think a person can not possibly be so stupid or desperate as to not do something, they go and do it and set a new low.

While I think all of our ideas are great and will each have their own level of success, I think that in this environment we need to put some serious thought into it and not accept any one idea because it is inevitable someone will find a way to ruin it.

What we need is a plan that solves our problems and at the same time tries to deter people from wanting to get around it.

Do you see my point?

Right now we have a few paths to take.

We have:

1) Don't do anything.

2) Remove post count from the main page and only allow it to be seen in a person's profile.

3) Only show the "stars".

4) Show the "stars" on the main page and posts in the profile.

5) Get rid of all indicators of post count.

Is there anything else?

I think an important thing to consider is that there needs to be more moderator action taken. If there was a serious punishment for breaking these rules then they would not be broken. Start handing out suspensions for rule breakers. That sounds like a good deterrent to me!

I think an important thing to consider is that there needs to be more moderator action taken. If there was a serious punishment for breaking these rules then they would not be broken. Start handing out suspensions for rule breakers. That sounds like a good deterrent to me!

Forums run by moderators with an iron fist are not fun.

I think the moderators of this particular forum are unobtrusive and because they rarely involve themselves in little scuffles they've earned alot more respect from us and we are more inclined to sit up and pay attention when they do think it is necessary to put in a warning. I wouldn't like to see that change.

Yeah and because of that people think they can walk all over the mods here.

And you know what? That can!

I will cite an example. Zombie told me that he did not care what he did because the Moderators would not do anything about what he did. And he was right. It was MONTHS before someone actually got up and did something about him and by then all of his damage had been done.

I am not saying the Moderators are lazy but they are too laid back when it comes to exercising their power.

Troublemakers here do not associate what they do with any form of punishment. That needs to change.

LadyM telling someone to stop is not going to do all that much when the person on the other side does not really care.

Yeah and because of that people think they can walk all over the mods here.

And you know what? That can!

I will cite an example. Zombie told me that he did not care what he did because the Moderators would not do anything about what he did. And he was right. It was MONTHS before someone actually got up and did something about him and by then all of his damage had been done.

I am not saying the Moderators are lazy but they are too laid back when it comes to exercising their power.

Troublemakers here do not associate what they do with any form of punishment. That needs to change.

LadyM telling someone to stop is not going to do all that much when the person on the other side does not really care.

PatMan, you don't know the whole story. There is a lot more to it than that. However, I can't go into any details, so don't ask.

I dont see why we need to sacrifice anything, the spam is constrained for the most part to the forum games and there's lots of people who just enjoy the forum games and aren't going to stop because you take away the post count. I agree that the post count's could limit unnecessary spam and the stars are still useful to determine if someone is likely to know what they're on about but I think the general friendliness of the forum is a testiment to the success of the moderator's minimal involvement. Sure, you can name a bunch of incidents where bad things have happened and punishment was necessary and i'm happy to admit that there will be circumstances the mods need to intervene, thats why we have moderators in the first place! But for the most part and the day to day running of the forums the moderators have a good thing going and dont need to change their system.

I'm happy with the effectiveness of social pressure and our moderators to ensure that that any potential Spam outside Forum Games will be minimised and contained. I think that addresses at least one of the criticisms people had of removing post count in Forum Games, though I don't know to what extent other people agree with me.

As long as people are polite about it I dont see why it wouldn't work. Just so long as it doesn't turn into something akin to butchering the newbie coz they posted a topic that already exists. That bugs me.